Minkovski notes that the words “communism” and “socialism” have become once again commonplace since the 2008 election of President Barack Obama, as “right-wing” politicians have accused the Democrats of moving the nation toward these types of societies.

Additionally, polls have shown that Americans are increasingly favorable toward socialism and communism, at least in theory.

“It’s very silly and a desperate attempt to try to smear Democrats because of the history of anti-communism in this country,” Communist Party USA Vice Chair Libero Della Piana said of the charges against the Democrats. “The right wing in this country has always used anti-communism as a way to shut down progress and to shut down positive legislation and to shut down discussion. It goes back to the McCarthy period and long before that.”

Another Communist Party member, Dr. Norman Markowitz, a professor of history at Rutgers University, also speaks in defense of the communists. Opposing him, Della Piana and Truthout contributor Sam Sacks, is Benjamin Shapiro, a syndicated columnist and author of Porn Generation: How Social Liberalism is Corrupting our Youth and Bullies: How the Left’s Culture of Fear and Intimidation Silences America.

Watch how Markowitz and Della Piana try to defend Obama and the Democrats, by minimizing their own influence and making a joke of the issue.

To the public, the Communist Party USA tries to appear moderate and even occasionally at odds with Obama and the Democrats. In reality, the Communists and Democrats are working hand in glove, mainly through the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

Despite facing four opponents, Shapiro does a good job of countering the propaganda. He does make one mistake, common to many conservatives, in conceding that capitalism has an inherent flaw – the so-called “boom-bust cycle.”

“Boom-bust” is caused by state run or state chartered central banks, manipulating interest rates and/or tightening credit, in order to cheat basic market forces. In other words, socialism is to blame for “boom-bust,” not capitalism.

Two seemingly unrelated events—Obama’s nomination of Chuck Hagel as Pentagon chief and the sale of Al Gore’s Current TV to Al Jazeera—are coming together in a way that illustrates the role that the foreign propaganda channel can and will play if Congress lets the television deal go through.

House Homeland Security Committee chairman Rep. Michael McCaul is being encouraged by a group of media critics, journalists, academics, and national security and Middle East experts, to open hearings into Al Jazeera’s media power play on American soil.

In regard to Hagel, Breitbart blogger William Bigelow notes that Al Jazeera seems to be having a love affair with the Obama nominee. Bigelow wrote, “Al Jazeera is rejoicing in his nomination for Secretary of Defense.” Aaron Klein of WorldNetDaily notes that Hagel gave Al Jazeera an interview in 2009 arguing that the U.S. and Russia should phase out their nuclear weapons.

At the time, Dmitry Medvedev, a Putin puppet, was the president of Russia. Asked if there was “something special” about Obama and Medvedev, Hagel said they were both young men who were “different” and “not captive to the Cold War generation.”

Obama told Medvedev in 2012 that he would have more “flexibility” to make concessions to the Russians after he was re-elected. That time is now and the Hagel nomination appears to be part of the pro-Russia strategy of making those concessions.

It is Hagel’s possible impact on the Middle East, however, that is getting most of the attention so far.

The Al Jazeera story on Hagel was titled, “Obama defeats the Israel Lobby.” The author, MJ Rosenberg, is identified as a former “Senior Foreign Policy Fellow with Media Matters Action Network,” the George Soros-funded group.

But if Al Jazeera likes Hagel, the feeling is mutual. The Washington Free Beacon has posted a clip from the Al Jazeera interview, in which Hagel agrees with the observation from a viewer that America has an image as “the world’s bully.” He clearly enjoyed the appearance on the Qatar-owned propaganda channel and thought nothing about bashing his own country.

At the very least, as the favorable coverage of Hagel shows, the new “Al Jazeera America” network that is supposed to replace Al Gore’s Current TV will be extremely left-wing in its political orientation, possibly further to the left than MSNBC.

Based on what is known about the channel and its existing Arabic and English versions, even more extreme elements will be integrated into the programming over time, once the channel gains some hoped-for traction in the media marketplace. This deception will depend on continuing inaccurate coverage of the channel’s real agenda.

The truth about Al Jazeera’s new entry into the U.S. media market is being deliberately obscured by such reporters as Dylan Byers of Politico, who cites claims about editorial independence for the new channel without bothering to note, as documented in the State Department’s own human rights report, that “the government [Qatar] exercised editorial and programmatic control of the channel through funding and selection of the station’s management.”

Qatar is an Islamic state, governed by Sharia, which supports foreign Jihadists committed to the destruction of Israel and America.

Hagel appeared on Al Jazeera as a representative of the Global Zero advocacy group. This is significant for two reasons—one of the main funders of Global Zero was the Soros-funded Connect U.S. Fund, and press relations for the group was handled by Trevor FitzGibbon, a former vice president at Fenton Communications who had also supervised media relations and strategy for MoveOn.org. He now runs FitzGibbon Media.

All of these entities deserve some comment.

MoveOn.org was created as a political force, which used the Internet to save Bill Clinton from impeachment over his lies in the Monica Lewinsky affair and grew into a formidable left-wing organization active in various domestic and foreign issues, such as the Iraq War.

Fenton Communications represented Soros in 2004 when he spent millions of dollars to defeat George W. Bush for president. The firm has also represented a Who’s Who of the left, including Marxist governments in Grenada and Nicaragua, the communist guerrillas in El Salvador, and CIA defector Philip Agee.

The Connect U.S. Fund, a project of the Tides Center, provided grants to pro-U.N. groups around the country, in order to create the appearance of public support for more U.S. involvement in the U.N.

“In just a few hours,” the FitzGibbon media website says, “FitzGibbon strategists can transform a client’s news into a story on the front page of Huffington Post, book your principals on MSNBC, and schedule interviews on NPR.”

This helps explain why The Huffington Post ran the article, “Why Chuck Hagel Should Be Secretary of Defense,” on January 7. The client in this case was the author, Rick Jacobs of the Courage Campaign, a new “progressive alliance” designed to push U.S. policies further left. Jacobs chaired Howard Dean’s 2003 presidential campaign in California.

Responding to the charge that Hagel once opposed homosexuality, Jacobs assures his audience, “Chuck, like most Americans, has evolved, has changed his views on homosexuality.”

On the matter of policy toward Iran, Jacobs says, “Had America wanted an administration committed to war with Iran, we had our chance. We want and need a defense policy that defends American interests.”

The implication is that destroying Iranian nuclear weapons would only benefit Israel, and that the Obama-Hagel approach is to live with a nuclear Iran.

The media manipulation goes way back. The Global Zero website says, “Trevor has been involved with Global Zero since its launch in December 2008 and orchestrates the movement’s international media strategy. He has successfully placed Global Zero leaders in front of a wide range of audiences on shows including ‘60 Minutes,’ ‘Meet the Press,’ ‘Nightline,’ ‘The Colbert Report,’ ‘Situation Room,’ ‘The Rachel Maddow Show,’ ‘Countdown with Keith Olberman’ (sic), and networks such as Al Jazeera, BBC, CNN International, NPR, FOX, Phoenix TV (China), and NHK (Japan).”

So now we know how Hagel got that appearance on Al Jazeera. But getting Chuck Hagel on Russia Today television was equally controversial and casts doubt on the former senator’s understanding of how foreign-funded channels use Americans for propaganda purposes.

Eli Pariser, President of MoveOn.org, says about FitzGibbon: “For six years, while at Fenton Communications, Trevor was our lead media relations partner. Reporters know and love him. He’s tireless, brilliant, and he made getting MoveOn on everything from the Colbert Report to Meet the Press look effortless. Trevor’s work has been one of the keys to MoveOn’s success—we couldn’t recommend him more highly.”

It seems relatively easy for the left-wing to manipulate and use the media for their own purposes. It’s good to have all of this on the record.

FitzGibbon also represents Rebuild the Dream, the group started by Van Jones, the disgraced former communist activist fired by the Obama Administration when details about his background came to light. Natalie Foster, Co-Founder and CEO of Rebuild the Dream, says, “The FitzGibbon Media team has a rare knack for spotting what’s newsworthy, and the amazing relationships to help it get into stories and on the air. They were a tremendous help on putting our independent book ‘Rebuild the Dream’ onto the NYT Bestseller list, and continue to use the media in positioning Rebuild the Dream and Van Jones as leaders in the fight for the American Dream.”

Hello everyone! Well, it’s been an interesting week with Obama and Biden taking on American freedoms and the NRA, basically practicing class warfare on gun owners. Today, I am going to start a 3-part article on Joseph Stalin’s war on the Ukrainian peasant farmer and the death and misery connected to this little known and never taught bit of Soviet Union history. Warning: some parts will contain graphic stories of cannibalism!

THE PEASANTS OF THE UKRAINE

In 1927, the average farmer in the Ukraine was a pretty happy fellow. For the first time, the land he worked on was his and his alone. The Bolshevik government needed a recovery, so they gave peasants some economic freedom to speed up this recovery. But again, there were still parts of this country that were run on the old feudal system. The average Ukrainian farmer was a proud and hard working man, who was rightfully stubborn about his traditions.

THE GOVERNMENT PARTY

All of the government party agreed in 1927 that they needed to upgrade and modernize all of their agricultural methods. But the problems they found were many. Specifically, not enough land with an ever increasing population. They were hindered by primitive farm technology and the farm yield hadn’t changed for 200 years.

Then there was the Russian elitist view of the peasant farmer. One group saw them as the backbone and the soul of the country and the hope of the future, while the second group viewed them with hatred because the more radical intellectuals tried to recruit them for socialist positions. But many said no to this.

Then there was Lenin’s view of the farm peasant. His views matched Karl Marx’s views on personal property ownership, which is to say, the farmer worked for the state and all of his property belonged to the state. Karl Marx and his followers had a great distaste for the average working peasant and even more hatred for small scale production and individual achievement from this dirty tiller of the soil.

“The interest of socialism are above
The interest of the right of
Nations to self-determination”
– Lenin

Every week on Monday morning, the Council and invited guests weigh in at the Watcher’s Forum with short takes on a major issue in the news, the culture or pretty much whatever you could imagine! This week’s question: Is a reasonable solution possible on the upcoming debt ceiling controversy? What do you think such a solution would look like?

Bookworm Room: The only solution I can think of is to cut spending drastically. As that’s not going to happen, I don’t know what else anyone can or should do.

The Noisy Room: I have to agree with Bookworm on this one. There is no reasonable solution left.

The Razor: Afraid I agree with the ladies. A reasonable solution isn’t possible because Obama doesn’t accept we have a spending problem. It’s like expecting an alcoholic to stop drinking when he doesn’t think he has a drinking problem. Unless Obama hits bottom we have to wait until the next president I’m afraid…

Rhymes With Right: Is a reasonable solution possible? Well, I suppose that depends upon what one means by “a reasonable solution.”

If one means a principled solution that actually addresses the underlying issue of the national debt and the deficit that are destroying our economy, I would have to say that there is no possible chance. Obama has declared spending cuts to be off the table and that he will veto any that come his way. Obama’s minions in the Senate will stand by him and call the GOP uncompromising if they do attempt to pass such a principled solution. And the media will, of course, stand with Obama as they always do.

On the other hand, a “reasonable solution” in the form of moderate Republicans abandoning all principles and becoming Obama’s political catamites is always a possibility. We’ve seen such subservience in the past, as supposedly conservative Congressman submit to whatever degradation is demanded of them by the Democrats and the press corps. At that point the debt limit will be increased — or perhaps eliminated, and all pretense of the Congress having the primary role in exercising the appropriation and spending power will be gone. The media will consider that solution “reasonable” — and will credit Obama with a political victory while damning the GOP as spinelessly submissive and irredeemably irrelevant. I therefore have no use for such “reasonable solutions.”

JoshuaPundit: I think inserting ‘reasonable’ into the question was a nasty trick (heh)! Of course President Obama’s notion of what is ‘reasonable’ is going to differ from anyone who’s mastered elementary math. Even a crack dealer in South L.A. or Bed Sty has enough of his or her brains together to understand that you can’t stay in business if more continually goes out than comes in.

This president has arrogantly said that spending cuts are off the table. But Congress has a remedy to force an agreement, or at least a legitimate budget, something we haven’t had in years.

According to our Constitution, Article I, Section 8 says clearly that Congress and only Congress holds the purse strings. President Obama has no authority to borrow a dime. Telling the president and the American people publicly that the House will simply not authorize any new spending whatsoever until President Obama agrees to spending cuts in a reasonable fashion and OKs a realistic budget is the means our founders devised to force the president (or more likely, someone like VP Joe Biden) to come to the table and make a reasonable agreement, which should include cuts in defense as well as in entitlements and a number of President Obama’s more harebrained schemes, like the billions spent on ‘green energy’ companies run by well connected Obama campaign donors. Items like uncovering and ending MediCare fraud, reversing GM’s $450 billion tax break, examining the salaries and budgets of President Obama’s innumerable czars, social security reform and a decent line by line scrutiny of where outflow can be cut should also be included.

It has been argued that President Obama can bypass Congress by simply arguing that Section 4 of the Fourteenth Amendment gives him that authority. A careful reading of Section 4 makes that a dubious notion at best since it only refers to ‘debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion.’

President Obama’s attempt to skirt Congress would almost certainly be denied by the Supreme Court if the president tried it, under the Separation of Powers clause among other reasons as well as Article I, Section 8, which in clear wording gives Congress and only Congress the authority to borrow monies. Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of the UC Irvine School of Law and a noted Constitutional scholar very much on the left end of the scale has some convincing legal and practical arguments on why a presidential attempt to expand executive power in this area would fail dismally.

The bottom line is that President Obama’s reckless financial propensities can be brought to a sharp halt by the adults in the room. But will the House stand firm and actually do it? That’s the question. If they are unable or unwilling to do so, not one of them, Republican or Democrat is worthy of the office he or she holds.

The Independent Sentinel: There is no point in racking my brain to come up with reasonable solutions. There should be equal spending cuts for every dollar increase but Obama has no interest in that.

President Obama has made it quite clear there will be no debt ceiling. Even with the debt ceiling, he piled up 6 trillion in debt and runs over a trillion dollars in deficits a year. Can’t wait until I see what he does without the debt ceiling.

Hey, this is what the people voted for, including those who voted two or three times. It’s what the people want apparently.

The Glittering Eye: Unfortunately, no deal is possible, at least no deal that actually solves the problems that we have. Both parties have agreed not to increase the taxes on 99% of the people in the country. That was the last deal.

You can’t get enough revenue just by taxing the top 1% of income earners. That leaves cutting expenditures. Republicans are resisting cutting spending on the military and Democrats are resisting cutting healthcare spending.

Those, Social Security, and interest on the debt are the major expenditures. If we don’t pay the interest on the debt, it will ruin the country and Social Security remains the third rail of American politics.

Bottom line: you can’t get enough revenue and there’s no agreement possible on cutting. No deal.

Well, there you have it.

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum. And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council and the results are posted on Friday morning.

It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and believe me, you won’t want to miss it.

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